We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.
I remember when I first read this for the 100th time. Haha. I just remember thinking maintenance............???? I don't even know what condition I am in spiritually! Do I even have a spiritual condition? How am I supposed to maintain something I can't even see? I could start topics at meetings for a year straight on all the questions going on in this alchy's head! Either that or I can start rereading the Big Book and talking to other A.A. friends before and after meetings, not to mention my sponsor!
One thing my sponsor has been telling me lately. Prayer and meditation is something that we need to start..........and continue (big emphasis). He also told me, just yesterday, that I should maybe think about using my brain before making decisions. Wow! What a concept, huh?
What I keep doing is trudging along this happy road. This is one messed up road at times. Seems like I'm a mouse in a maze with hidden potholes, u-turns, and occasional dead ends. Such is life.
Two things that I'm working on lately.......
Trying to find the good in a bad situation.
Trying not to find the bad in a good situation.
I'm gonna close this ramble with a lil excerpt from the 10th step.
And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone, even alcohol. For by this time sanity will have returned. We will seldom be interested in liquor. If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame. We react sanely and normally, and we will find that this has happened automatically. We will see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes! That is the miracle of it. We are not fighting it, neither are we avoiding temptation. We feel as though we had been placed in a position of neutrality safe and protected. We have not even sworn off. Instead, the problem has been removed. It does not exist for us. We are neither cocky nor are we afraid. That is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition.
Wow, you just triggered such a beautiful memory that took place years and years ago and I remember as if it was yesterday. The simplicity and joy I felt during this moment all came rushing back to me.
I was sitting in my car in a parking lot at a fast food restaurant not wanting to go in because I had the worste hangover ever in my life. I looked in the mirror and I looked horrible..mind you I'm a pretty good looking cookie here...ha! It takes a load of drinking to make this girl look like the gutter...but I did look like the gutter..pale, pastey, mouth had loads of cotton in it and my eyes had that pink glaze over them. I was so embarressed and broke as a person and I asked myself how do I get myself out of this mess....how do I reach out to him?? I forgot where to start. So I get my dizzy and cloudy head out of the car and walk into the resturaunt...I order and sit down and out of nowhere I hear a man saying something outloud....I look his way and then I realized that this gentleman was praying outloud for me to hear.
This is where I start I said to myself. I rushed out of the resturaunt not even eating my food because I was so blessed at that moment I couldn't stay...I had to run out to my car because at that moment I felt that HE is there when we are sooo down and HE listens and cared enough about Me at that moment to give me what I needed to hear. I was in his presence and all I wanted to do was pray so I went into my car and prayed and cried and just praised him.
Hey Phil, I haven't been doing too much dancing lately. Grrrrrrrrrr! Haha.
Thanks for that wonderful response Tina! It's incredible when I think about the things that have directed and re-directed me on my journey towards sobriety.
Poor Justin, no dancing eh? Not even a gentle fox trot? It's those young one's gyrations that are the killer, right? (no, I've never fox trotted, but it is fun to watch others who know how). I'm afraid that deep down, I am still a gyrator at heart. My body just doesn't react as easily to it.
I love how the word "neutrality" was used. Of course there are the times when I'm under stress that I am not in that mode, and do a tad of struggling. Not so much to not drink as to keep my sense of balance, to not over react. Trying to keep my spiritual self in the forefront, and move past my over active ego. But I bless those days that can run into months, where I am not struggling, where my ego is set aside long enough to just go with the experience and try to learn the lesson from it. Or, atleast set my grumblings aside long enough for the lesson to present itself. But the joy in any of these experiences, positive and negative, is that more often than not, drinking has nothing to do with it. The thought simply doesn't come up. It has ceased being an option. That doesnt mean that the occassional "voice" doesnt come up, but it has become much easier to shush it up. I was so young when I began using, so i remember a milestone for me was when I'd been clean and sober for more years than I'd used. That gave me hope that maybe I'd be able to retrain my thinking, LOL. Not.
But truly, the Problem really has been removed, and I do feel safe now, more secure in my spirituality and less fear driven by something that is continuing to become a stranger. Thanks for the post, Justin. Hug, wren
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"Never argue with an idiot... They'll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience..."
fox - trot could do it during a drunk - am much better at it now that I am sober - I -truly enjoy dancing - haven't done it for years (that I can remember) Cheek to cheek dancing is the best kind of all.
Any takers - PHIL
Later - jeannie
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You only live once; but if you work it right, once is enough. There is nothing better than the encouragement of a good friend.
um...Jeannie? Justin just had a --hmmmm...shall we say... a surgical procedure....
Different cheeks involved...(smiling)
As for dancing? Yup..its been a long time..
A Fox Trot? What the "H" is a fox trot?
I know rock and roll...and break dancin...and the lets shake it stuff...plus the slow romantic...holdem stuff....but the "Fox Trot?" ...must be a down in the valley thing..is it?
and....Thanks for the invitation...but I've turned gay.....:)
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"LOVE" devoid of self-gratification, is in essence, the will, to the greatest good...of another.
fox trot isn't a "down in the valley" thing it's an "old age" thing so I figured at your age that you wouldn't have any problem at all remembering the fox trot or are you at that age where you're having "seniors moments" - here's an example - you walk into the bathroom (to go) and forget why you're there. As for you being gay - well that totally and completely explains everything. ROFLAO
Later - Jeannie
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You only live once; but if you work it right, once is enough. There is nothing better than the encouragement of a good friend.
